Stanford University is entangled with Big Oil.

 

Our Demands

As scientists and students , we are calling on Stanford leaders to decline funding from fossil fuel companies and divest the endowment from Fossil Fuels.

We are asking school leadership to: 

  1. Set inclusion and exclusion criteria for industry-funded research partners. This process should be transparent and based on quantifiable, Paris-aligned criteria. Research has shown that none of our current fossil fuel partners are Paris-aligned.

  2. Commit to enforcing the criteria once they are published, and

  3. Phase out funding from industry partners that do not meet the criteria. 

Read our full Fossil Fuel Dissociation Brief

We are calling on the Stanford Board of Trustees to divest the endowment from fossil fuel companies.

Learn about our Divestment Legal Complaint

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Why we care

Accepting fossil fuel money and investing in Oil & Gas undercuts swift climate action and harms Stanford itself by:

  • Fossil fuel companies continue to look for new oil and gas fields to exploit - efforts which are on their face incompatible with reaching targets for a sustainable future - and they use Stanford research to help them do this.

  • Fossil fuel money pushes research towards climate “solutions” that are non-threatening to fossil fuel companies, and which delay or detract from real solutions.

  • Stanford affiliation and Stanford’s refusal to divest helps fuel companies foster the misleading narrative that they are working in good faith toward a real energy transition.

  • Stanford affiliation helps fossil fuel companies bolster their lobbying efforts in policy circles, while they work to block policy that promotes swift climate action.

  • Partnering with fossil fuel companies risks the school’s real and perceived academic integrity and independence, as well as its reputation in the eyes of students, faculty, policymakers, and the public.

“[At the Doerr School,] [we] have the responsibility to examine and ensure that our partnerships align with our values, vision, and ambition. We are, therefore, confronted by the ethical question of how we identify external organizations and how we should partner with them in research and educational collaborations. At the heart of the issue are key questions: What are our values? What are our goals and ambitions?”

”

— Arun Majumdar, incoming dean of the Doerr School of Sustainability,

May 25 2022